Film Review: 1941 (1979)

Film Review: 1941 (1979) | Ecency

(source: tmdb.org)

1941 was a very bad year for most of humanity. Producing a film named after that year, set in that year and made as a comedy didn’t seem a very good idea. Unsurprisingly, such a film, made in 1979, is nowadays mostly known as the first major misfire in the career of the great and usually successful film-maker Steven Spielberg.

1941 actually wasn’t that bad for people fortunate enough to live in countries untouched by the Second World War. This situation, however, changed for inhabitants of the US West Coast after December 7th and the Japanese surprise attack on Pearl Harbor. With most of the US Pacific Fleet wrecked, many believed that a Japanese invasion of California was imminent, and General Joseph “Joe” Stilwell (played by Robert Stack) had the difficult task of preparing a defence and suppressing widespread panic and mass hysteria among the citizens. On December 13th, some of those concerns came true with the arrival of a Japanese submarine under the command of Commander Akiro Mutamura (played by Toshiro Mifune), a dedicated officer who, despite low supplies and problems with navigation, wanted to stage a symbolic attack on Hollywood. As he prepared for an attack, various characters – both military and civilian – were preparing for a large dance competition in Los Angeles that would ultimately turn into a mass riot.

Following the unprecedented success of Jaws and Close Encounters of the Third Kind, Spielberg was given an enormously high budget for his next film and, just like many film-makers in similar situations, couldn’t resist the urge to have each and every cent visible to the audience. The result is a film that relentlessly displays special effects – mostly those based on miniatures and pyrotechnics – and does so in quantities that made 1941 more than two and a half hours long (in the Director’s Cut version), which is quite unusual for comedies. Unfortunately, the script by Robert Zemeckis and Bob Gale – which was very loosely inspired by real incidents that occurred in 1942 and 1943 California – simply fails to provide a coherent plot that would bind those scenes together or offer some sort of parodic treatment of American militarism or gung-ho patriotism. Even worse is the situation with the characters, played by a small army of otherwise talented actors, here reduced to one-dimensional caricatures whose only motivations are basic instincts like fear, sex or militaristic bloodlust. Exceptions like Robert Stack, whose no-nonsense military character represents the only anchor of normalcy in the film; or Dan Aykroyd as the civic-minded Sergeant Frank Tree, whose dialogue lines are the only thing that actually makes sense in the film, won’t change the general impression. This approach begins to become tiresome as the film approaches its end; the scriptwriters, having lost inspiration and sense of humour, try to compensate for it with simple slapstick and endless scenes of destruction and mayhem. In the end, despite hundreds of artillery shells and thousands of bullets fired, nobody actually dies.

1941 was widely perceived as a major flop after its premiere, when it was received poorly by critics and underperformed at the US box office before turning a profit after international distribution. The reception of this film as an absolute failure isn’t completely justified. There are some bits in which Spielberg shows his brilliance, especially in the memorable opening scenes featuring Susan Backlinie and parodying the opening scene in Jaws. A great deal of effort was invested in recreating the early 1940s Southern California through costumes, popular music and props, including things that are rarely used in WW2 films like 40 mm Bofors anti-aircraft guns and M3 Lee medium tanks. Spielberg also used the services of composer John Williams, who created another effective soundtrack which allowed the film to sound better than it actually was. And, beneath all the mayhem and madness displayed on the screen, you can’t fail to recognise Spielberg’s genuine affection for the period, which would be used as a setting for his later and much better films. 1941 was a misfire for Spielberg, but also a lesson well-learned.

RATING: 5/10 (++)